by Susan Shreve
“Are you turning in here?”
There was silence.
“Are you? Are you turning, Jack?”
“I am. I said I would and I am.”
Jess felt the turn to the left because it was sharp, a squeaking of brakes, and then the car slowed over gravel and stopped.
They opened the doors.
“Are you sure we’re allowed to be here at night, Angel?”
“Why not? They would lock the gates if we were not allowed, and they didn’t.”
The man grunted.
Jack, Jess thought. She wondered if she had seen him before, if he was the small man she thought he was, and he had pulled her into the car because he recognized her. He had seen her before, standing with Ruby outside room 618. He had seen her chase him into the garage.
“The kids from the high school have sex here because it’s dark.”
“So they leave the place open for the kids to have sex? I don’t think so, Angel.”
The doors shut.
They seemed to be gone a very long time. Jess couldn’t tell. Her cell phone vibrated in the pocket of her jeans but her hands were tied. Certainly it was Teddy. She had told Teddy she was leaving the hotel. Someone might have seen her leave, maybe even seen her pulled into the car. But if that were true, they would have followed the car and they would have found her by now.
It must be the cemetery where the car was parked — gates, kids having sex, that sort of thing.
Jess knew a lot about sex mainly from Teddy and she was interested. But sex in a cemetery?
What was in the cemetery? Who had died? Was it a child in the cemetery?
Of course not Baby Ruby, Jess thought, trying to be very reasonable, although she imagined the worst. Too short a time had passed. Four hours at the most.
Baby Ruby was a screamer. That worried Jess. A screamer was hard to kidnap. Too much noise. Whoever had taken her from the room would want her to stop screaming.
They were back in the car, the woman weeping again.
“Now to the flats.”
“Is it safe?” the woman asked.
“Safe?”
“Safe for us to go there and do what we have to do.”
“Nothing’s safe, darling. We made this decision together. Remember?”
“I remember.”
He turned the radio on again to Jess’s relief. She was listening to a conversation she didn’t understand and it made her nervous. She knew that what she didn’t know must have to do with Baby Ruby. Otherwise, Jess would be no use to these people. No reason to tie her hands and legs, to put her in the bottom of their stinky car.
“What about the girl?” the woman, Angel, asked again.
“The girl?” Jack said. “We’ll get to that problem when we arrive at the flats.”
“What are you thinking of, Jack?”
“Nothing. I’m thinking of nothing. I wasn’t expecting the girl and there she was and stupidly I dragged her into the car. Now what? That’s what I’m thinking.”
The police were not ruling out that a guest at the hotel had kidnapped Ruby. In fact, that was the most likely scenario in kidnappings, Detective Van Slyde told them. One of the risks of hotels is that they don’t check out the backgrounds of the guests. Anyone who has a credit card in good standing can make a reservation.
“We’re on this case,” the detective said. “And I know how hard it is to wait for more information to come in.”
“I can’t wait,” Delilah said. “It’s not in my temperament. If something’s the matter, I need a task.”
“I’m afraid your job is to wait, Mrs. O’Fines.”
Danny was weeping.
“I feel like you think this is my fault,” he said. “All of you except Mom.”
“It’s not your fault, Danny,” Beet said. “All you did was blow the babysitter job.”
Teddy sat down beside him on the end of the bed.
“It’s just an awful thing that happened,” she said.
Growing up, Teddy had not liked Danny. He was selfish and self-centered and called her stupid. You’re okay, Ted, he’d say. Just a little stupid.
But since he’d married Beet, she thought of him as a wimp.
Now she put her arm around him, rested her head on his shoulder, and consoled him.
“Jess will find Ruby,” she said. “She’s very brave and she has instincts.”
“I told her not to take her eyes off Ruby the whole night.”
“Shut up, Danny,” Beet said from the corner of the room where she sat curled in a ball with her head down.
“She has the instincts to figure things out,” Teddy said. “I bet right this minute she has a hunch about Baby Ruby and she’s following her instincts.”
“So why doesn’t she answer the phone?”
“She’s too busy,” Teddy said.
“Finding Ruby?” Danny asked quietly.
“Finding Ruby.”
Detective Van Slyde, on his cell phone, had moved to the door to leave, but he motioned Teddy to come over.
“I don’t have much to tell you but we’re working on this.”
“What about Jess?” Teddy asked.
He shook his head. “Why didn’t she let us know when this happened?”
“She was embarrassed, I guess. Or ashamed. She’s a really responsible girl,” Teddy said. “I wouldn’t want you to get the wrong impression.”
“I don’t have the wrong impression. You’ll let me know if you hear anything at all. I’m going back down to the security office if you need me.”
He shut the door.
“I never trusted the police,” Aldie was saying. “I grew up at a moment in time when trusting the police was a mistake.”
“What moment in time was that, Aldie?” Delilah asked.
“Same moment that you grew up,” Aldie said.
“Don’t argue,” Beet said. “Please don’t argue.”
Teddy leaned against the wall next to the door and took out her cell.
Where are you? she texted. ARE YOU OKAY?
Still there was no response.
Jess was not okay or else she would text back. She would say help if she needed help. If it were possible, she would alert Teddy to trouble.
“Listen, you guys. I think we should go downstairs and sit in the lobby,” Teddy said, addressing her family scattered around the room. “It’s too intense locked in this room together.”
“I’m not going anyplace,” Danny said.
“Me neither,” Delilah said. “We can’t be in public, Teddy. We’re too upset.”
“Then if we’re going to be here stuffed in this room,” Teddy said, “we have to be a family.”
“We are a family already,” Delilah said.
“Then we have to be a good one.”
“However terrible we feel, we have to pull together,” Delilah said.
No one spoke. Whee was arranging the pearls on the bodice of her dress to conceal the mark of lipstick. Beet was in the corner, her knees up, her head resting on her arms. Danny sat in a chair in front of the television screen, his head thrown back, his hands locked in a tight fist. And Aldie paced.
Delilah had taken a notebook out of her bag and was furiously writing.
“Notes to help the police,” she said to no one in particular. “I can’t just sit around and wait. I don’t have the temperament for it.”
Teddy was the one holding her family together. Teddy O’Fines, juvenile delinquent, high school dropout, kleptomaniac, the humiliation of her parents, the child least likely to succeed, was the one in charge.
She sat down beside Beet. Sat there without speaking, close but not too close, absorbing the heat of Beet’s anguish just being beside her.
She had risen to the occasion of her family’s disaster and somehow, looking around the room at each of them, she was beginning to feel affection for Delilah and Beet, even for Danny, surprising affection that she had not felt since her parents divorced.
Th
e road to the flats was bumpy. Jess tried to keep her head off the floor by straining her neck so that she didn’t bump it over and over as they drove the rough terrain. If they left her in the car while they packed to go to Omaha or Canada or wherever it was they planned to go, if they left her for long enough so that she could untie the cords holding her wrists together, or wrest out the stuffing they had pushed into her mouth to keep her from making too much noise, then she could escape to text Teddy for help.
The car stopped. Someone opened a window and Jess felt a breeze brush over her back, heard the sound of rain.
“Jack, do you see that Bono is standing right in front of us under the hood of his truck?” Angel said from the backseat.
“I see him.”
“So he’ll know we’re getting out of town and he’ll tell. He could even tell the police. You know Bono. He’ll tell on anyone for a dollar.”
“He won’t know anything if we’re careful. Just go in the building, pack up — we don’t need much — slip outside when he’s not looking.”
“We’ve got to speak to Bono or he’ll be suspicious.”
“So speak to him. Say hey, Bono, just getting a couple of things my sister left at the flats.”
“What about the girl?” Angel asked.
“I’m covering her with a blanket so no one can see I’ve got a girl in the car,” he said. “This won’t take five minutes and then we’re out of here, on the way to your sister’s and freedom.”
The door opened — something heavy was dropped on Jess and the door shut.
“Hey, Bono,” Jack said. “How’s it going?”
Jess couldn’t hear the response from the man, Bono, but she did hear Jack’s muffled voice say, “Not true, Bono. Just more bad talk from the flats.”
And then the voices were gone. Jess assumed that Jack and Angel had gone into the flats, whatever the flats were, and that the man Bono was still working on his truck, and it frightened her to think that someone could peer into the car and make out the shape of a girl under a blanket and do something to her.
She needed a plan. So far she was piecing together a part of the story — where she was, what Angel and Jack were doing. She imagined the flats were a dangerous part of Los Angeles where desperate people lived who had guns and didn’t care what they did to hurt other people. Even Angel seemed to be afraid of the flats, although it appeared she lived there. She had things to pick up necessary for their trip to Omaha or Indianapolis.
Whether or not Angel and Jack had anything to do with Ruby, Jess guessed they were escaping Los Angeles because they had done something bad, something illegal, or they had committed a crime and the police were looking for them.
If they were the ones who had stolen Baby Ruby, then perhaps they were taking Ruby on their escape. Or possibly Baby Ruby was at the sister’s house. Or maybe Jack and Angel were not the ones who had kidnapped Baby Ruby and were in trouble for other reasons.
But if that were true, why would Jack have run away from Jess in the parking garage or pulled her into the car and tied her up? And why would Angel — it must have been Angel smelling of rosemary in the linen closet — have been hiding?
As long as Jess was tied up on the floor of the front seat of the stinky car and not dumped on some road or in some building like the flats, as long as she was alive, then there was still a chance that she would find Baby Ruby, or Ruby would reappear somewhere, at the sister’s or in the flats or at the airport.
And if nothing happened to Jess, then there was a chance Baby Ruby would materialize and Jess could grab her and run.
That was her thinking when Angel and Jack opened the car doors and climbed in. They didn’t talk. Jack turned on the engine and drove out slowly. Angel was crying, little half sobs coming from the backseat.
“Not so bad,” Jack said.
“I think Bono’s going to call the police.”
“He doesn’t have a phone, Angel. He’d have to get his car working again and drive to the station.”
“That could happen.”
“Unlikely,” Jack said.
And then they were silent.
Jess was beginning to feel sick, stuck in the front seat with no room and no fresh air to breathe and the awful smell of the carpet on the floor of the car. Then the car turned left, then right, then right again, one street after the other.
“I’m getting carsick,” Angel said.
“Get a grip, Angel. We’re almost at your sister’s and she’s got bus tickets.”
“Bus tickets? You said we were taking an airplane and we’re not even going to Canada.”
“We’re taking a bus to Oregon and then we’re flying somewhere but not to Canada. I told you that.”
“You told me we weren’t going to Canada. Not about the bus.”
“Your sister didn’t think it was a good idea to go to the airport where there are all those inspections to make sure you’re not carrying a bomb. So she got bus tickets for us.”
Angel was crying again and then she stopped and they were driving for what seemed a very long time and then the car stopped.
“So here we are,” Jack said.
“Jack?”
“No more problems, please, Angel.”
“I don’t want to leave Elena here.”
“We’re too far down the road to turn back. You were the one who wanted do this. Not me. I went along because I love you and now you are driving me crazy.”
“But what about Elena?”
“Elena is dead, Angel. We have to get out of the car now, go into your sister’s, and do what we planned to do.”
“What about the girl?”
“We’re leaving the girl.”
“In the car?”
“Here, at your sister’s, in the car, and your sister can drive us to the bus station.”
“We can’t do that. The girl’s heard us talking. She knows our names.”
“Listen, Angel. Who’s to say anyone is going to find her?”
“They’ll find her if you’re planning to just leave a car with a girl tied up in it. She’ll say our names. And the police will know who we are. They’ll be waiting for us at the bus station in Oregon.”
A car door opened and Jess heard a woman’s voice.
“Come on in,” the woman said. “There’s a bus goes early tomorrow. Six a.m. You can spend the night here.”
“I think we should get out tonight,” Angel said. “The police are clued in.”
“Then you’re going to have to drive,” the woman said. “No buses until tomorrow morning.”
“But we’ve got a girl on the floor of the front seat.”
“What girl?” the woman asked.
The car doors closed then and Jess was alone again.
So that was the sister, Jess thought. They were at the sister’s house.
And what about this girl Elena? Dead Elena. Was she the one in the cemetery?
She tried to turn over but could not. There wasn’t enough room in the bottom of the car to move at all. She rubbed her wrists together, hoping to loosen the rope tying them, but they were bound too tight.
The phone in her back pocket rang and rang. Then a whoop. Likely Teddy.
If she was quiet and careful not to move, if she let herself sink into the stinky carpet, then she might fall asleep. Struggling to free herself wouldn’t make a difference. The ties were tight and she was trapped in too small a place. A strange sleepiness was overtaking her and she was surprised at how calm she felt. Better to sleep. With no hope of escaping, she had too much time to think.
Teddy was scrunched between the bed and Whee’s giant suitcase, her head in her hands, staring at a stain on the carpet, her heart beating as if it had jumped into her mouth. Delilah didn’t help. Teddy could see her leaning against the closet door, her eyes closed. From time to time, a plaintive animal sound escaped from deep inside her, and then Danny’s loud voice:
“PLEASE, Mom.”
“Teddy?”
It was
Delilah.
“Do something,” she said. “So far no one is doing anything useful.”
“What can I do, Mom?” Teddy asked. She was thinking the worst, as she tended to do.
Maybe it was already too late, not just for Baby Ruby but also for Jess.
She had called Jess at least fifteen times — whoop, whoop, whoop, and on and on. And there was no answer. Teddy was certain Jess was somewhere she should not be.
“Teddy?” Delilah asked. “Maybe if you went to Detective Van Slyde by yourself. Maybe he’d give you some information. The police have to have some information by now.”
“I’ll do that, Mom,” Teddy said, heading toward the door just as Victor Treat was arriving.
“So, guys,” Victor said, addressing the room. “What we need to do is cancel the wedding.”
“Cancel the wedding?” Delilah said. “The wedding is planned. It’s set to go. We will have the wedding tomorrow afternoon at the Brambles Hotel.”
“Don’t be a martyr,” Beet said from her corner of the room. “Of course you’ll have the wedding whether we’re there or not.”
“Let’s wait,” Aldie said. “I’m optimistic. I’m very optimistic.”
“You don’t stop the wedding just because —” Delilah began.
Whee got up, crossed the room, and went into the bathroom.
“Everyone is fighting because we’re all on edge,” she said and closed the door.
And quickly, before anything else got said, Teddy fled the room.
Things were bad enough with Baby Ruby missing, but now Jess. If Baby Ruby wasn’t recovered by morning, Teddy imagined the O’Fines family exploding in little pieces all over the Brambles Hotel.
Teddy stepped into the elevator, her head down so she didn’t have to look at herself in the mirror. She wasn’t aware that someone was already in the elevator, going down in the middle of the night. She saw her in the mirror — the same woman with whom she had ridden earlier that evening.
“Oh, hello,” the woman said. “So nice to see you.”
Teddy folded her arms across her chest, avoiding eye contract.
“I was at my niece Miranda duFall’s wedding, my great-niece. Do you know her?”